


Following Lunar Flowers

by KivaEmber



Series: Go, Wolfboy, Go! [2]
Category: Persona 5
Genre: Akechi Goro and Sakura Futaba Are Half-Siblings, Alternate Universe - No Metaverse (Persona 5), Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Found Family, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Slow Burn, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:28:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29590731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KivaEmber/pseuds/KivaEmber
Summary: On his birthday, in the dead of night, he loaded up his school bag with clothes, food and a few, paltry things from when he lived with Mom - and climbed out of the window into wild freedom.or;Following the life of Goro Akechi, orphan and of werewolf lineage, stumbling his way into family, happiness and love. It takes a bit though.
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Amamiya Ren, Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira, Akechi Goro/Persona 5 Protagonist
Series: Go, Wolfboy, Go! [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1844281
Comments: 6
Kudos: 87





	Following Lunar Flowers

This wasn't the first time Goro was out at night. It was a regular thing, where Mom would give him money for the bathhouse (and sometimes a little extra to grab something from a late-night street stall) whenever she had ' _ clients _ ' around. He never liked those men, but Mom was tough and good so he was never  _ too  _ worried about her when she sent him away. Maybe he felt a little lonely, but he wasn't  _ worried. _

He got worried on full moons, though.

The build up would be like this: Mom would carefully count what few savings she scraped together when the moon was a few days away from being full. It will never be enough for what she wanted, but she would still take Goro to the convenience store and let him pick whatever instant meal he liked. He always chose the cheapest, because he knew the money wasn't there, even if it meant eating something he didn’t really like. Once Mom had three days worth of food stockpiled for him, she would say  _ "I’m sorry, I have to leave for a few days, sweetheart." _

She never said why, but that was because the both of them knew. Goro would say  _ “but I want you to stay here” _ and Mom would say  _ “I don’t want you to see” _ and that would be that. Goro could never find the right words to change her mind.

On the day she’d leave, her eyes would be very bright, her teeth a littler sharper, her temper shorter and she would spend the hours leading up to her departure restlessly cleaning the house. Goro never minded it - or, he did, but it was  _ fine _ , because he  _ understood, _ but Mom would continuously say  _ “sorry, I’m sorry, sweetheart, I didn’t mean to snap, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’ll be leaving soon, I’m sorry, sweetheart” _ and then she’d leave. 

That was the monthly routine. It had gone on for as long as Goro could remember, except when he was younger and his memories fuzzier, Mom used to have some of her work friends look after him. They had been nice; like Mom, except not, with the same tired look, same heady perfume concealing the wildness beneath, and the same kind of smile, but their visits became less and less and soon Goro had no choice but to look after himself when Mom went to hide out during the full moons. 

It was lonely. It was  _ painfully _ lonely. Not scared or anything, no, he could look after  _ himself, _ but. The apartment was too quiet, and the neighbours next door always screamed at each other in the early hours of the morning, too loud, too angry, and he never slept or really ate the food Mom stockpiled for him, which made him feel terrible for being an ungrateful child, but he could never force himself. 

So, that was why tonight, just a few weeks shy of his tenth birthday, he decided to do something about it.

\- 

It was a little after eight o’clock when Mom left the apartment after kissing him on the forehead goodbye. The sun was sinking behind the tall buildings of their street, painting the sky in splashes of gold and red; an hour or so before the full moon began to take its effect. Goro waited for a bit, until he was sure Mom wouldn’t double back for something she forgot, before picking up his bag and leaving the apartment. 

He vaguely knew where she was going - people talked about where those like Mom went during the full moons - but he had another way of tracking her down. Mom’s scent was unique, easily picked out amongst the urban stink of exhaust and hot tarmac and people, so he stuck his nose high in the air, inhaled deeply, and followed it. 

It led him through busy streets that turned sharply into narrow alleyways, cramped and winding, transitioning into the backstreets jostling with salarymen off work. Everything edged on too loud and bright, Goro gripping his bag straps tight in his small hands as he squirmed through the sea of adults, trying to keep the scent of Mom above the acrid stench of drunk men and hot food.

He almost lost it a few times - each time sending his heart in his throat because he had no idea how to find his way back home - but he eventually left the crowded backstreets, and its conflicting smells, behind. A short, narrow alleyway opened up into a quiet industrial complex, looming warehouses with dark windows and even darker corners. The sun had completely set at this point, and it made the noise of claws scraping cement and the low, rumbling growls of beasts echo ominously between the silent warehouses.

But Goro belonged here, so he walked with his chin tilted up and his nose angled to catch Mom's scent, finally tracing it to a rusted shipping container on the edge of the industrial complex, squatting in the shadow of a warehouse with most of its windows smashed in.

Goro loitered just out of view of it, unshouldering his bag and yanking it open. Inside he had a change of clothes, just in case, but he also had the  _ most important things: _ his ears and tail. 

The hairband was marketed for girls, but Goro didn’t let that bother him as he carefully slotted it in place, pinching at the cheap felt of the ears to make sure they perked up properly. He squirreled and saved a lot of change leftover from the bathhouse visits for this, and a part of him felt guilty - he could have given that change back for Mom - but he felt like this was important too in a way beyond physical things like food. He was used to being hungry anyways. 

Next he attached his tail, a strip of soft furry fabric he ‘borrowed’ from his school’s arts and craft box. This he didn’t feel guilty about, because the teachers said horrible things about his mother when they thought he couldn’t hear, so he could steal whatever he wanted from them in retaliation, were his feelings on the matter. He carefully tied the tail to his shorts from a small hole he made in the waistband, yanking the knot tight and miming a tail wag by gripping the base and waving it. It was perfect. 

He took out an old makeup mirror from his bag, inspecting his face. He was proud to say he looked a lot like Mom, with the same hair and eyes and face, but on these days, Mom was a lot more  _ different. _ Goro wasn’t sure how to fix his face to match hers, so he carefully extracted the makeup box filled with the stuff Mom forgot to throw out because they were practically empty, and scraped the last of the eyeshadow onto his fingertips to darken his nose and draw whisker marks on his cheeks. 

That’ll have to do. 

He pushed the mirror and makeup box away, shouldering his bag and swallowing down the buzz of nerves. Mom would probably be mad that he followed her here, but he knew it was  _ important. _ He couldn’t stand another lonely night in that apartment, listening to the neighbours scream at each other and keeping the lights on because the empty dark scared him. He didn’t want to hear Mom saying  _ “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” _ every time he asked her to stay, because she thought - something. Goro didn’t know what she thought, but he knew she was  _ wrong _ and he was here to prove that he  _ didn’t care, _ that he loved her no matter what face she had right now. 

So, he adjusted his ears, made sure his tail was tied on tight to his short's belt loops, and snuck towards the gaping, open hole of the shipping container. He drew in a deep breath, so deep his ribs hurt, and lunged inside with a loud, warbling;  _ “AWOOOOOOO!” _

He got a faceful of fur, an earful of Mom yelping a shocked  _ “Goro!?”, _ and a bite of pain from the rough floor scraping the skin off his knees. He didn’t care, listening to the metallic echo of his own enthusiastic howl fading into the night and throwing his arms around whatever he could reach. Mom’s scent, and something heavier, muskier, but still Mom, filled his nose, settling whatever nerves he had. 

“Goro,” Mom rasped again, and he felt the heavy weight of her arm rest on his back, pinning him close, “What- how did you-?”

“I followed your scent,” he mumbled into her ruff, giving her a squeeze before leaning back as much as her hold would allow. He came nose to snout with her, an eyeful of sharp teeth and jaws wide enough to bite off his head. Goro didn’t care, it was only Mom, “And, and look! I’m just like you! So you don’t need to hide from me, see?”

Goro pointed at his ears, at his tail, and at his cheeks, where he hoped his nose and whiskers didn’t smudge off. 

Mom stared at him, and it was hard to tell what she was thinking. She looked bigger than he remembered, broad-shoulders and bulky, her fur honey-brown and slightly curling because it was long, just like her hair. She was still pretty, to him, and he didn’t understand why Mom wanted to hide this from him, when they were the same. So, Goro stayed strong, smiling, smiling, smiling, ignoring the chill of the shipping container creeping up through his skinned knees.

It was so lonely here, so cold, and it made Goro wish even more that she changed back home instead, in their too small apartment with one bed and Mom’s compulsive need to wash the sheets three times a day before he could even touch it. 

“Goro,” Mom finally said, breaking the strange silence between them. Her snout dipped a little, her dark nose nudging against his forehead, “You sweet,  _ silly _ boy.” 

“I’m not sweet or silly,” Goro grumbled, puffing his cheeks out before lifting his hands, fingers curled like claws and baring his teeth in a snarl, “I’m a wolf!  _ Rawr! _ ”

Mom made a soft noise, like a whine, back in her throat, and ruined Goro’s fearsome display by squeezing him closer and licking his cheek. He whined theatrically, wriggling as if to get free, but he ended up burrowing close against her warm side instead, grinning widely and giggling when Mom nuzzled his hair. She almost knocked his wolf ears off, but that was okay, he forgave her for it. 

“What am I to do with you…” Mom murmured, sounding strangely sad. 

“You could come home?” Goro said hopefully, his voice muffled into her fur.

Her arm tightened around him a fraction. 

“I’m sorry,” Mom said, quietly. 

“It’s okay,” Goro said, even though it wasn’t. 

He wished she’d stop saying  _ “sorry”  _ for things.

Mom held him in silence for a long while, long enough that his legs started to fall asleep. But that was fine, because this was still a thousand times better than their empty, lonely apartment. So, he tucked his legs closer, resting his head in Mom’s soft ruff and ignored the crick in his neck. He can sleep here. He can even  _ live _ here, if that's what Mom wanted. He didn’t need a bed, or a bathroom. Real wolves lived in the woods anyways, not apartments.

Goro found himself slowly drifting off, and he couldn’t help but wish, for what felt like the millionth time, that he took after his Mom in more than just her looks. That he could be like her on the full moons and have fur and fangs and claws, instead of being awkwardly stuck in between, a lingering legacy of his absent human father that didn’t belong in Mom’s world or anywhere else. 

Goro wished for a lot of things, but he was resigned to never seeing a single one come true. 

Except for this one thing: 

“...you’re right, sweetheart,” Mom whispered to him, her warm breath stirring his hair, “I shouldn’t keep leaving you alone. I promise I’ll stay home with you.”

That wish came true, at the very least. 

* * *

Or so he thought. 

* * *

The full moon came again, and this time Mom stayed home. 

Goro vibrated with excitement, even though Mom told him to go to the bathhouse when dusk started to touch the sky,  _ ‘just for an hour or so, sweetheart’, _ and he didn’t protest. Mom’s eyes were filled with shame, but she was still  _ staying, _ so Goro felt this was good progression. If she wanted her transformations to stay secret, then he wouldn't look. 

He scrubbed himself clean at the bathhouse, enjoyed a free drink at the end, and went straight home with a skip to his step. The full moon was barely visible past the glare and glitz of Tokyo’s towering buildings, and Goro squinted up at it, seeing its silvery face half-hidden behind dark clouds. He always felt strange beneath the light of the full moon, more… energetic, bouncy,  _ fizzing, _ like his pulse was on a hair trigger. 

Goro checked his fingernails. Normal and human. His canines felt a little sharper though.

He pouted. 

He got home and all the lights were off. He could smell Mom though, so he wasn’t worried. He called out his arrival, kicked his shoes off, left his bathhouse bag next to the door, and shook himself like a dog. His hair was still wet from the bath, the long strands clinging to his neck and cheek. It was getting shaggy again. 

“Mom?” he called again, lifting his nose to the air and sniffing. Yeah, just Mom. Their apartment was small, two rooms and a tiny bathroom where the toilet and cubicle shower were practically on top of each other. Mom wasn’t in the living area, which meant… bedroom. 

Was she asleep?

“Mom?” he whispered, tiptoeing across the dark room, easily side-stepping various items strewn on the ground. He had very good night vision, and the neon glow of the streetlight spilled between the slats of their window blinds, bathing everything in disorientating stripes. The neighbours were arguing again, muted thumps as drawers were opened and closed, a door banging, and a woman shrieking shrilly. Goro winced at the pitch. 

He opened the door to their shared bedroom, peeking through the gap. Mom was lying on the floor next to the futon, her large, furry form curled up into a tight little ball, like she was trying to take up as little space as possible. The lights were off here too, and the light spilling from the window reflected in her eyes as bright, golden discs. 

“Goro,” Mom whispered, her voice raspy and low. 

“I’m back,” Goro said quietly, though he wasn’t sure why their voices were so hushed. He crept inside, took one look at the futon and favoured Mom instead. Her fur was thick and plush and warm, and he curled up against her side and buried his nose into her ruff. She smelled like: Mom, and something sweet and artificial, perfume? It clashed horribly, but he didn’t care. 

They were quiet for a long time. The neighbours kept arguing. 

“I don’t deserve you,” Mom said softly. 

Goro didn’t know what she meant by that. There was a strange note to her voice, and it made him feel uneasy. 

“You’re my mom,” he said, like that explained everything - and it  _ did _ \- but Mom just sighed, quietly, like it was lacking. 

“You’re not like me, sweetheart,” Mom said, “You can- you can  _ pass _ as human. You’re so, so special… but, because of me, you’ll never…”

She didn’t finish. 

“What?” Goro sat up a bit, trying to catch her eye. She evaded, turning her head away and tucking her snout beneath her arm, “I’ll never what?”

“...nothing, honey. I’m sorry,” Mom muttered, “I’m just tired.”

Goro felt unsure, some higher instinct whispered something was  _ wrong, _ but… Mom did look tired, and he didn’t want her to change her mind about spending full moons at home, so he snuggled close to her again, ignoring how the hard floor was kind of cold and hurt to lie on, but refusing to abandon her for the more comfortable futon. 

This was fine. So long as he was with Mom, everything was fine. 

* * *

A week later, and Mom’s mood considerably improved. There was none of that heavy-limbed gloom she had been dragging around their small apartment all week, her hair freshly washed and her make up immaculate. Goro asked if she had an important client for tonight, and Mom had laughed, hugged him tight and said that tonight was  _ "just for them". _ Somehow, despite Goro never seeing her take any clients recently, she had enough money to splurge on a small outing, nothing impressive, but amazing to Goro all the same. He was dazzled by her energy, and let himself get swept up into it.

Some instinct pointed out this was strange: where did this money come from? Why was Mom so happy for no reason? But he didn’t want to go back to the worrying gloom of before, so he kept his mouth shut and went with it. He shouldn’t be anxious because Mom was happy again, right? Right. 

Everything was fine. 

* * *

The following morning, Mom sent him off to school with a homemade bento, average by society's standards, but extravagant by theirs. Mom must have hit a  _ really _ big windfall to splurge on such luxury, and lunchtime had been good. Goro made sure to eat every last bit of it and spent the rest of the school day smiling.

Then he went home to the police and a crowd outside.

* * *

The last memory Goro had of Mom was her kissing him on the forehead and saying  _ “I love you, sweetheart”. _

In the weeks that passed since then, he obsessed over that memory, frantically combing over the details of it: Mom did her hair up, and had put her makeup on, and had her nicest dress and her warmest smile and  _ nothing _ to indicate that she would- she would-

( _ people tended to forget that he had good hearing, that, just because his lycanthropy didn’t manifest on full moons, he wasn’t as mundane as full-blooded humans. goro sat in the back of the police car, the door slightly cracked because it was summer and the air was sticky and hot, and could hear over the mumble of the crowd, the growl of running car engines and cicadas, the policemen saying in low tones to each other: _

_ “-the neighbour rang it in, when they found the note pushed under the door. she didn’t want her kid to find her first.” _

_ “then why didn’t she do it in some alleyway somewhere else? werewolves, honestly. they don’t think.” _

_ “messy too. right in the bathtub, slit her wrists-” _

_ goro put his hands over his ears, pressed them hard until it hurt, and wished, wished, wished he couldn’t hear- _ )

-how did he miss that? No, he didn’t miss it, he  _ ignored _ it. Mom had been sad, then suddenly happy, and he knew it was weird but he said nothing. If he said something- maybe, if he didn’t go to school that day. He should’ve faked a stomach ache, or, or, did something, and he obsessed and obsessed over that last memory- 

_ (“I love you, sweetheart.” _ )

-he obsessed over it, and thought back to moments before: Mom crawling into the rusty shipping container miles from home, because she didn’t want him to see. Mom saying that he was ‘lucky’ that he didn’t have to worry about the transformations, that he could ‘pass’ as human with poorly hidden jealousy. Mom saying that she wished she could do more, earn more, than she was sorry, always sorry sorry sorry sorry-

Goro wished he could say to her, back then,  _ “don’t say sorry, Mom, please stop saying sorry, I love you and I don’t care if you’re a werewolf and if things are hard, I love you I just want you to stay please don’t go please don’t go please don’t go-” _

But it was too late for that now. So, after a few weeks obsessing over it, Goro neatly folded up that memory, in half, in fourths, in eighths, and tucked it into his heart instead. 

* * *

He never attended the funeral. He didn’t even know if there had been a funeral. Goro was instead moved halfway across the city and into a crowded foster home with children who sneered and turned their noses up at him.

Dog boy. Mutt. Bitch. Animal. Beast. Those had been their names for him, the moment they realised who his mother was. Had been. Was. Had been. 

Goro didn’t care. Goro _didn’t care._ He looked at these ungrateful, mundane _prey animals_ and bared his teeth because - it was _their fault._ Not _them_ specifically, but this rotten society they were mired in. Blindly parroting lies and gossip about his mother because it was a game to them, unaware how every sharp word slowly shaved more and more of Mom’s soul away until she thought the best thing for him was to _die_ and he _didn’t forgive_ _them._ Will _never_ forgive them, ever. Never **_ever._**

So they called him ‘dog boy’. They called him ‘mutt’. They called him ‘beast’. And in return he bared his fangs, snarled, and went for the throat. 

Before he reached the age of twelve, he was cycled through more foster homes than he cared to count. ‘ _ DIFFICULT’, _ ‘ _ AGGRESSIVE’  _ and  _ ‘BEHAVIOURAL ISSUES’ _ dogged his unhappy journey, but Goro didn’t care. He didn’t need to be normal, he didn’t want a new family. He wanted Mom, but these awful people stole her from him. All that was left was this agonising pit in his stomach that made him want to bite and howl and thrash in his shrinking cage, like the trapped animal that he was. 

Something needed to give, eventually. 

* * *

It gave on his twelfth birthday. 

His current foster home was cold and cautious - a place for troubled children, it boasted, but the other children and the staff all gazed at him like he was a rabid dog prowling the building, shooing him away or locking him in the Bad Room if he so much as growled or snapped. It was too much - the last straw - it was- them,  _ them, _ shoving him into the empty shipping container that Mom hid herself away in out of shame and Goro  _ refused _ for them to make him ashamed. He wasn’t ashamed of any of this! He was  _ proud _ of his Mom’s blood, and he wouldn’t tolerate them trying to make him think it’s something he should  _ hide, _ should  _ cover up _ and  _ pretend never existed-! _

So on his birthday, in the dead of night, he loaded up his school bag with clothes, food and a few, paltry things from when he lived with Mom - and climbed out of the window into wild freedom. 

**Author's Note:**

> so yeah this will follow goro throughout his life fhdhhss akira won't turn up for a few chapters and even then it'll be slow burn but hey, it's about werewolves! sorry if this chapter felt a bit fast paced, it's more of a setting the scene before we get to the really good bits fhdh
> 
> A note for this AU: 
> 
> Werewolves are BORN, not made, though there are beliefs amongst normal humans that werewolves can 'infect' you with their bites despite evidence saying otherwise. In actuality a werewolf bite (even when they're in human form) will just make the victim extremely ill - if they don't die of blood loss first. 
> 
> Another note: it's extremely hard for a normal human and a werewolf to conceive a child, like, insanely hard, so people like Goro (a half-werewolf, half-human) are extremely rare and their status tends to vary wildly for each individual. Some are like werewolves where they have full moon transformations, some are completely like normal humans, and some are like Goro, where they have some werewolf qualities but don't transform on full moons. However that does mean Goro is 'human-passing' because of the lack of full moon transformations, so he dodges a few of the problems other werewolves encounter in society. 
> 
> i hope that explains the werewolf situation a lil'


End file.
